


Heroes by Circumstance

by LadyTeldra



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Cookies, How do I tag?, Multi, Multiple Wardens, Possibly Slowburn?, Two Wardens, just people in general, poor duncan
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-23
Updated: 2016-10-23
Packaged: 2018-08-24 03:47:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 994
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8355832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyTeldra/pseuds/LadyTeldra
Summary: "When the bushes beside him rustled and a figure came around the tree the elf panicked instead of hiding deeper in the woods at the sign of others. THWACK!Therefore it was in this life, that the wandering elven mage hit a Grey Warden over the head with his staff. Thus, one Dalish recruit became two and the course of history changed."Aldon was a mage who wandered the forests of southern Ferelden, Aleythea is a hunter from a Dalish clan, Duncan is the poor soul that found them both. Here two paths cross that were never meant to and destinies intertwine. Two Wardens who never wanted to be heroes become so when no one else can step up to the plate.





	

**Author's Note:**

> So, this is because I put way too much thought into characters and my friend is just as bad. I have a tendency to play mages and she plays despises doing so. We happened to end up talking about Dragon Age, our characters started becoming people, and this happened. Tada! 
> 
> I am writing this mostly by myself with ideas and a shoulder to cry on provided by DominoTNK.
> 
> Disclaimer: If I owned it, I would not be in debt for schooling. I'd be sitting on the beach drinking martinis in France or something.
> 
> PS. I personally read this chapter in a narrator voice.

The choices you make define who you are. Some people choose to do good, others, bad, and sometimes people do neither and both. The choice is not always conscious and many are not aware of their own influence. Of how even the lack of action has consequence. But every choice made, or not, makes a ripple and this ripple affects the ripples of others and therefore defines others as well. It is the far reaching alterations of choices that lead to the analogy of butterflies and tornadoes.   
  
Despite the questionable logic of that analogy, the idea behind it holds truth. Small changes, little things here and there, add up. Enough changes add up to a large change in the overall scheme of things, but in the same note, enough small ones lead to something large happening. It is the way of the world.   
  
A smile during a dark moment can change a day. A gentle touch can sway a mind. A word can make or break. In the same train, a word can also lead to death. A touch to insanity. A smile can enthrall. The inactivity of one may lead to the death of hundreds, the action of another to thousands. They change futures, lives, loves.    
  
Sometimes, people that would never meet do, those that would do not. Lives begin and end at differing points due to different choices by many, but no difference will ever be noted.    
  
In one lifetime, a Dalish hunter and her friend Tamlen would come across an ancient ruin and, thinking them elven, explore. They would find an odd mirror that when touched would knock her unconscious. A Grey Warden, known as Duncan, would find her in his travel through the Brecilian forest and return her to her clan’s camp. She’d awake two days later, barely recovered from the last wave of fever and retrace her steps to the cave in a search for Tamlen. Instead, she’d find Duncan at the end. In front of the shattered Eluvian, he’d explain how the artifact was tainted. The seeing glass somehow capable of transferring the Blight to her. He’d give the ultimatum of death or the Order before returning to inform the others. Choosing recruitment, they would quickly return to Ostagar in an attempt to save her before it progressed much further.   
  
In an alternate lifetime, Duncan would travel to the Circle of Ferelden to recruit more mages to the order, their skills invaluable in the war against Darkspawn. He’d haggle with the Templars for hours, appraising them of the threat the world faced. The Templars would deny his requests, disbelieving of the possible danger and unwilling to part with their charges. He’d resort to forcefully conscripting a single mage. A young elf left to the Templars and later given the name Surana in lieu of his clan’s. He had just past his Harrowing only to fall into the plot of an escaping blood mage that was thought a friend. They’d make their way to Ostagar, keeping to roads to help acclimate the mage to the world outside, Duncan’s task complete and several Templar’s disgruntled by circumvention of punishment.    
  
In another lifetime, Duncan would travel through neither the Tower nor the Forest. The Dalish hunter would die of the Blight even once found by her clan. The mage would face punishment for the escaping blood mage, charged with the crimes himself and forced through the Rite of Tranquility. He’d die when demons overrun the Circle, unable to defend himself from the onslaught.   
  
In an even more varied lifetime, that same elven mage, would change his fate as a child, turning his back on the settlement his clan led him to and taking his chances with the woods he often called home. He would force control on himself, managing enough luck to avoid both detection and possession. Making a living selling parts of his kills and trading items found in the woods, he’d never stay in one area for long or interact with others too often. He’d survive among the forests as the Blight came to Ferelden. In this, Duncan would travel through the Brecilian as in the first. They’d pass the mage by mere moments as the hunter’s pace slowed them down despite the silence that prevailed their journey. The mage continue his aimless wandering as the Hoard progressed, the Darkspawn would eventually find him unawares and overwhelm him. He would die outnumbered and alone, never knowing what the world outside his exile held or the fate he may have had.   
  
In this lifetime, however, the hunter bounced back quickly from her gloom. Suspicious and untrusting, her need for answers would outweigh her hesitance and her grief, while heavy, would not overwhelm. She'd chatter and snark at her guide, asking questions without answers and learning what she can of outside world while possible. Duncan, weary of the constant interrogation, would call for a stop within the forest near a river to allow his charge to ‘rest.’ He would scout ahead just a little faster than with the ill hunter by his side.   
  
As such, the mage would find himself resting against a tree trunk for but a moment as he drank from a water skin. And so, when the bushes beside him rustled and a figure came around the tree the elf panicked instead of hiding deeper in the woods at the sign of others.   
  
_ THWACK! _   
  
Therefore it was in this life, that the wandering elven mage hit a Grey Warden over the head with his staff. Thus, one Dalish recruit became two and the course of history changed.   
  
This is the story of two of people who were not meant to meet. A tale of two possible Warden recruits where only one was meant to be. Two people meant to fulfill the same destiny, whose paths crossed despite, or perhaps to spite, the hands of fate. Those whose lives would never intertwine but for small changes here and there.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I do know the l multiple wardens plot is overdone, but this is more for my own practice than anything and hopefully someone will find enjoyment from it. If nothing else, enjoy the pain I go through when editing and still failing to catch all the mistakes or something.
> 
> The romance will take a while to actually form. They’re all rather stubborn.


End file.
